Gov. Abbott poised to ban Fort Worth Sister Cities relationship with China. Leaders react

Fort Worth’s 14-year diplomatic relationship with a Chinese city is poised to be outlawed — at least for the next 18 months.

Gov. Greg Abbott is expected to sign a bill banning Texas cities from having sister cities relationships with communities in countries deemed a “foreign adversary,” including China, North Korea, Russia and Iran. As of May 29, the bill was on Abbott’s desk awaiting his signature.

Fort Worth will have until October to dissolve its relationship with Guiyang, China — a city of about 6 million people and one of Fort Worth’s nine sister cities since 2011.

In a provision lawmakers added to the bill in mid-May, the ban would expire in January 2027 at the start of the next legislative session, when lawmakers would have the chance to renew it.

“Sister cities” are municipalities that enter into citizen-driven, diplomatic, cross-country relationships to share cultures, host each other and build a global relationship. President Dwight Eisenhower created the international initiative in 1956, believing personal relationships between cities could help prevent future conflict.

Fort Worth leaders lamented the Texas law as it took shape, insisting the sister cities program was volunteer-led and had no ties to organizations undermining the U.S. government.

“While I recognize the importance of protecting Texas from foreign influence, our sister city programs are transparent, locally managed, and focused on education and cultural exchange,” said City Council member Michael Crain, who represents parts of west Fort Worth and is the council’s liaison with Guiyang, in a statement to the Report.

Crain has previously insisted “wholeheartedly that sister cities has no ties to any organizations that are undermining our government.”

The bill was proposed by Rep. Angelia Orr, R-Angelina, and supported by Tarrant-area Republican House representatives, including Rep. David Cook, R-Mansfield, and Rep. Giovanni Capriglione, R-Southlake. In the Senate, the bill received bipartisan support.

Orr has said the law targets cities with relationships to China who “expose themselves and their constituents, who are our constituents, to dangerous and completely unnecessary security risk.”

“China uses these ‘sister city’ relationships to influence our culture and trample American values,” Orr said April 1.

Fort Worth Sister Cities International’s other sister cities include Bandung, Indonesia; Budapest, Hungary; Mbabane, Eswatini; Nagaoka, Japan; Nîmes, France; Reggio Emilia, Italy; Toluca, Mexico; and Trier, Germany.

Fort Worth leaders oppose law

Kippen de Alba Chu, president and CEO of Fort Worth Sister Cities International, said he wasn’t surprised by lawmakers’ target on China, given the broader tension between the United States and China.

Still, he feels lawmakers’ suspicion of Chinese espionage through sister cities visits is unwarranted. The relationship mostly promotes and supports student exchanges and visits from high schoolers, and the U.S. Embassy in China must vet and approve all student visitors before they visit.

“I would think known spies to the U.S. would not even get visas to come to the U.S., right?” de Alba Chu, a native of Hawaii, said.

As the bill awaited Abbott’s signature in Austin, Fort Worth welcomed leaders May 29 from the Guizhou province, where Guiyang is located. The leaders’ visit was a standard, semiannual procedure that helps build relationships face to face, de Alba Chu said.

Council member Crain wrote Austin lawmakers a May 7 letter in opposition to the bill, expressing why he sees the restriction as harmful and an overreach of power.

Crain adopted his twin daughters from China in 2010 and lived in Beijing for eight years, serving as the city’s U.S. Embassy chief of staff before working for a law firm in China.

The relationship with Guiyang has brought educational exchanges, cultural events and business collaborations to both cities, Crain wrote. He added that the sister cities relationships “are not symbolic” and “support youth exchanges, economic development and cultural understanding that enrich our cities and our state.”

“A blanket ban sends the wrong message to Texans, especially our youth and Chinese American neighbors, by treating heritage and international connections as threats rather than opportunities for understanding and leadership,” Crain told the Report.

De Alba Chu, who said he also wrote lawmakers a letter of opposition to the bill, shared Crain’s sentiment about the relationship with Guiyang.

“It’s always been that the exchange is specifically for friendship, cultural exchange, language, etc. — all of the things that sister cities were established for by President Eisenhower,” he said. “It’s about building these relationships with people. We’re not building it with the Communist Party or with the government in China. It’s with Chinese citizens from the city of Guiyang.”

Fear of Chinese influence has yearslong, bipartisan roots

The fear of sister cities being a conduit for Chinese espionage has roots at the federal level dating to the Biden administration. Avril Haines, President Biden’s director of national intelligence, repeatedly referenced the Chinese Communist Party “exploiting sister city relationships” in briefs and conversations about national security threats from Beijing.

This year’s state legislation comes amid a nationwide movement to eliminate possible Chinese influence in any form, with state lawmakers in Tennessee and Arkansas pushing similar bills.

Orr, an author of the bill, said in a social media post that she filed the bill to “cut diplomatic ties with China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea.”

“Why on earth should we allow the Chinese Communist Party and other foreign enemies to influence Texas cities?” Orr said in March.

Also this year, lawmakers have advanced a bill banning “certain aliens or foreign entities,” including China, from purchasing or acquiring Texas property.

De Alba Chu said the city of Fort Worth will be the entity responsible for terminating the relationship, not the Fort Worth Sister Cities International organization. Once Abbott signs the bill into law, Sister Cities will await Fort Worth’s directives.

Fort Worth Mayor Mattie Parker’s office did not immediately respond to the Report’s request for comment.

Drew Shaw is a government accountability reporter for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at drew.shaw@fortworthreport.org or @shawlings601. 

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